Google turns its Calendar app into a personal coach

No more excuses. Google is adding a little virtual assistant to Google Calendar to help you reach your personal goals.

The company introduced a new feature to its mobile apps on Tuesday that will help you stay on track by managing your schedule.

A new "Goals" feature will ask what you want to achieve, how frequently you want to work on that goal, and what time you prefer to work on that goal. Then it looks through your calendar to block out time, rescheduling your goal if you add a conflicting event or choose to skip a practice or gym session.

"Calendars should help you make the most of your time -- not just be tools to track events," Jyoti Ramnath, a Google product manager, wrote in a blog post.

Ramnath also says that the feature will get better with more use because it will learn from how you complete, change or put off your goals.

All the major tech companies are in competition to build the best personal assistant service. Apple(AAPL) has Siri, Microsoft(MSFT) has Cortana, Amazon(AMZN) has Alexa, and Google(GOOGL) has Google Now.

Among the contenders, Google Now may know you the best if you rely mostly on Google's Web services. It already has a predictive "cards" function that shows you information you might be searching for before you ask.